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England vs England.

Scallywag

Banned
GA Gooch, WN Slack, DI Gower, P Willey, AJ Lamb, IT Botham, JE Emburey, PR Downton, RM Ellison, PH Edmonds, JG Thomas.

This is the english team from 1985, how do posters think the current team would fair against this team.
 

andyc

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
i think both teams would still find a way to lose
 
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FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
I think the current England team is better than that. Gooch wasn't that much of a player in 85, Botham was declining pretty badly, and however good Gower was he wasn't good enough to carry a team all on his own. Severely lacking in terms of bowling strength compared to the current mob too.
 

Scallywag

Banned
I would be very suprised if the current bowlers could keep Lamb, Gower, Botham and Gooch from scoring more than the current players.
 

luckyeddie

Cricket Web Staff Member
Scallywag said:
I would be very suprised if the current bowlers could keep Lamb, Gower, Botham and Gooch from scoring more than the current players.
If you were choosing them in their pomp, maybe, but by then Botham could barely kick Australia's butt, let alone anyone else, and Gooch hadn't really got going.

Gower, incidentally, would have had TEC clamouring for his exclusion from the side - I promise you that.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Scallywag said:
I would be very suprised if the current bowlers could keep Lamb, Gower, Botham and Gooch from scoring more than the current players.
If Gooch of 1989 onwards had been transplanted 5 years forward and Botham of pre-1984 transplanted 2 years back then no, of course they couldn't.
But with differing peaks that wasn't as formidable a line-up as it could have been.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Scallywag said:
GA Gooch, WN Slack, DI Gower, P Willey, AJ Lamb, IT Botham, JE Emburey, PR Downton, RM Ellison, PH Edmonds, JG Thomas.

This is the english team from 1985, how do posters think the current team would fair against this team.
And the only decent bowler in that side (on a non-turning pitch) was Ellison, though Botham was enjoying something of a last-hurrah that summer.
 

Swervy

International Captain
Scallywag said:
GA Gooch, WN Slack, DI Gower, P Willey, AJ Lamb, IT Botham, JE Emburey, PR Downton, RM Ellison, PH Edmonds, JG Thomas.

This is the english team from 1985, how do posters think the current team would fair against this team.
my instant reaction would be, despite some great player, the 85 England team would get its *** whipped by this one.

Actually in the summer of 85, I didnt think Willey played for England..I think he did tour the West Indies though because he was considered one of the best players of fast bowling in the country...Wilf Slack...wasnt Tim Robinson the opener with Gooch back then as well.

And from memory, werent players like Mr Injury Neil Foster around (on his day a very fine bowler)..Graham Dilley etc
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Swervy said:
my instant reaction would be, despite some great player, the 85 England team would get its *** whipped by this one.

Actually in the summer of 85, I didnt think Willey played for England..I think he did tour the West Indies though because he was considered one of the best players of fast bowling in the country...Wilf Slack...wasnt Tim Robinson the opener with Gooch back then as well.

And from memory, werent players like Mr Injury Neil Foster around (on his day a very fine bowler)..Graham Dilley etc
Averages from The Ashes from the year of my birth...
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
So replace Peter Willey with Gatting and the sides are pretty evenly matched... and both 2nd-best in their respective Worlds...
 

FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
Richard said:
So replace Peter Willey with Gatting and the sides are pretty evenly matched... and both 2nd-best in their respective Worlds...
England were better than Australia by 85, as Greg Chappell, Marsh and Lillee retired in Sydney in 1984, but Pakistan were better than England I think, and New Zealand were pretty competitive then too. Certainly not a very good England side.
 

Swervy

International Captain
FaaipDeOiad said:
England were better than Australia by 85, as Greg Chappell, Marsh and Lillee retired in Sydney in 1984, but Pakistan were better than England I think, and New Zealand were pretty competitive then too. Certainly not a very good England side.
yeah..England werent even close to be number two in 85. Pakistan were miles ahead, West Indies even further..New Zealand were probably a bit better then as well. India were on a level with England, despite Englands great win in India around then..the summer of 86, and India outclassed England.

Around that time my ranking would have been

1. West Indies
2. Pakistan
3. New Zealand
4. India
5. England
6. Australia
7. Sri Lanka (who the year before looked the better team vs England at Lords)

I think England went 4 years around that time having only beaten Australia in tests (other than a one off test vs Sri Lanka, who were pretty damned poor back then)

If it hadnt been for Sri Lanka, the 85 Ashes would have been a fight to avoid the wooden spoon in world cricket. That Aussie team is quite frankly the worst Aussie team I have ever had the embarressment to watch..and even then it was only 1-1 going into the fifth test.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
FaaipDeOiad said:
England were better than Australia by 85, as Greg Chappell, Marsh and Lillee retired in Sydney in 1984, but Pakistan were better than England I think, and New Zealand were pretty competitive then too. Certainly not a very good England side.
Hmm... Pakistan and New Zealand who squared-off home and away around the time and had little to separate them...
Pakistan certainly had a good side but things were little different to now, they were always mercurial and while they certainly could have beaten England they could have been hammered too.
Probably New Zealand's best side, too, but I don't think it was quite as good as England's.
It certainly wasn't a poor England side, one of the better ones we've had in the last 25 years. And that the current side is number-two says a lot about the low standard of Test-cricket ATM.
 

Swervy

International Captain
Richard said:
Hmm... Pakistan and New Zealand who squared-off home and away around the time and had little to separate them...
Pakistan certainly had a good side but things were little different to now, they were always mercurial and while they certainly could have beaten England they could have been hammered too.
Probably New Zealand's best side, too, but I don't think it was quite as good as England's.
It certainly wasn't a poor England side, one of the better ones we've had in the last 25 years. And that the current side is number-two says a lot about the low standard of Test-cricket ATM.
England would never have hammed Pakistan in the mid 80's..Pakistan were far too good for that...a lot has changed in that that Pakistan team from the mid to late 80's was very very good...the current one is average

And beleive me, NZ around 85-86 were a better team than England.

ENGLAND WERE NOT A GOOD TEAM
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
They might not have been a good one, but they certainly weren't poor. A side with Gatting, Gower and Lamb in it, plus a last-hurrahing Botham and a not-quite-yet-firing Gooch is not poor.
Certainly better than most sides in the subsequent 20 years, though obviously not better than Hussain's combination of 2000 and 2000\01.
Pakistan cricket, meanwhile, has ALWAYS had the chaotic streak. Even that side, who were good, had nothing on the side of the late '90s (Anwar, Ijaz Ahmed, Salim Malik, Inzamam-Ul-Haq, Youhana, Wasim, Waqar, Saqlain, Mushtaq, Shoaib), and they still didn't manage to achieve that much.
If Pakistan of mid-80s had played England they MIGHT have hammered them, they might have been hammered - that is ALWAYS (and probably always will) be the way with Pakistan.
 
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